In this paper, we present a few simple market-timing strategies that appear to outperform the quot;buy-and-holdquot; strategy, with real-time data from 1970 to 2000. Our focus is on spreads between the E/P ratio of the Samp;P 500 index and interest rates. Extremely low spreads, as compared to...

This study models the bid-ask spread in financial markets as a function of asset price variability and order flow. The market-maker is characterized as passively accepting orders to buy and to sell a security at the market's prevailing price (plus or minus half the bid-ask spread). The bid-ask...

The U.S, stock market entered 2000 with five consecutive years of exceptional gains. The S&P 500 index gained more than 18 percent each of these five years, and its value tripled since 1995. Concern has arisen recently that the stock market may be headed for a downturn because firms' share...

This paper argues that a test of beta insignificance, commonly used in empirical studies of the CAPM, predisposes studies toward rejecting the CAPM. Under the null hypothesis of these tests, the CAPM is false. Consequently, insufficient evidence to reject the null is taken as sufficient evidence...

This paper tries to grasp banks' motivation for entering derivative markets. The motivation question is interesting for the following reason: if banks' main motivation for using derivatives is speculation, derivatives are likely to increase the risk to banks' capital and thus increase the cost...